The Fatal Flaw
by leafiephoenix
Summary: Literature hasn't been her strongest subject. And he, of all people, provided her with the answers she needed. Sylar and Claire unwittingly find themselves discussing Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, unaware of how the parallelism hits too close to home.


Claire wasn't exactly a fan of Shakespeare.

This was why she preferred sitting for endless hours in Biology, rather than draining her wits out (even just for several seconds) trying to fathom the complexities of 16th century English. 'I'd be better off learning Latin,' she thought sulkily. Really, she had never really understood the need to chew and swallow the epic significance of dreadfully ancient plays when there were other much, much more important matters to pursue.

Saving the world, for instance.

Learning pitiable words such as 'prithee' and sputtering 'Sirrah!' out loud in class were unlikely going to take her anywhere.

So the class had discussed Julius Caesar. Claire hadn't been paying attention as per usual, her mind reeling away at how abnormal her normal life was, or how her ability might be able to help thousands, no, _millions _of people and more. Her thoughts snapped when the teacher handed out a new assignment to accompany whatever little chunk of Julius Caesar they had learnt that day.

She didn't even realize that her groan was the loudest. Not that she cared, anyway.

The assignment had been delayed for a week now, and it was due in two days. Procrastination had never been delightfully deterring.

The question had been simple – it was structured around how Julius Caesar's characteristics had any impact on his rise and fall within the realms of the Shakespeare play. With the text by her side and her fingers steady on the keyboard, she ransacked her mind for ideas that might be able to help her at least, start a sentence on the blank Word document.

_Tick, tick, tick. _

Moments passed. She hadn't typed anything. Instead, her fingers tapped the edge of the table nervously, coinciding with every second that ticked away.

Carefully, she began listing Caesar's positive qualities as she knew them from history – cunning, manipulative, brave – all of which that made him worthy of being close -- but not quite -- a Roman Emperor. While history accounts mostly sung Caesar's praises, Shakespeare turned the tables by featuring a weakened, old and _very_ stubborn Julius Caesar even from the start of the play. 'How apt,' she '_tch'ed _sarcastically, 'to have a play titled after one's name only to discover that said person to be brutally murdered merely half into the good stuff.'

She had considered going to Google for answers, but reading longwinded essays on the psyche of a _fictionalized, romanticized_ historical figure was not as interesting as the wonders of stem cells, mitosis and cellular regeneration. Besides, she would not sink so low as to commit plagiarism. Nope.

Although the idea seemed to be too awesome to not be acted upon.

She caught herself staring at a diagram of the cell cycle, mindlessly imprinting the words 'labile', 'stable' and 'permanent cells' in her brain before she realized how far she had strayed. 'This isn't going to work,' she harrumphed softly before reluctantly picking up the Julius Caesar text, flipping randomly to a page that hopefully, would shed some clues.

Of course, there were some commentaries about the play in the first chapter of the text. Blame it on her that she did not notice the chapter's existence before, or her life would have been a lot easier. There was not much on Caesar himself, to her dismay, since the Bard had deceivingly directed his centre of attention towards the Brutus-Cassius-Antony dynamics instead of the titular character.

But a word caught her eye, making her heart skip a beat.

_Hubris._

"Claire?"

"Huh?" she stammered and flinched in surprise at her name being called.

"Um, mom said dinner's ready," came Lyle's reply, his brows furrowed in wonderment.

"Yeah, I'll be down in a minute. Just...need to," Claire glanced at the tiny printed word again, "do something first."

"Ooookay..." her brother narrowed his eyes sceptically before disappearing down the stairs.

Claire highlighted the word and folded the edge of the page, reminding herself to study the passage in a more meticulous manner, right after dinner. "Hubris," she muttered to no one in particular. Somehow that one word fitted someone perfectly...

And that person decidedly wasn't Julius Caesar.

Claire shivered.

* * *

She returned to an empty room, just as she had left it.

She resumed her place at her desk, staring at her still-blank computer screen and reached for the Shakespeare text beside her.

Only it wasn't there.

"Hubris?" a deep, baritone voice chuckled sardonically.

Claire pivoted almost ungracefully to face the all-too-familiar intruder. Her eyes widened when she saw him standing there, forehead wrinkling, deeply engrossed in whatever was written in the Shakespeare text. He was nodding his head thoughtfully, as if in agreement with the commentary on the play. Claire took it as a signal to lurch towards the door in an attempt to escape, but Sylar was faster.

"This is getting too old," he sighed as he locked the door telekinetically. Claire tried screaming, but that was taken care of too. Bound by invisible restraints, Claire found herself unable to open her mouth, her body rigid and helpless and...

"Since I'm in such a good mood today, I've decided not to slam you against walls," his eyes glinted in the dim bedroom light. "For that, you've got to be thankful. Not as if you can feel the pain anyway, but I digress," he drawled idly. He flicked two fingers and Claire was forced to move towards her bed, where she was made to sit.

"If you promise not to scream, I'll let you talk," he ambled towards her desk, pulled up the chair and sat opposite her. "Promise?" he cocked his head and gave that infamous smirk that could only be Sylar's.

Claire nodded awkwardly, sweat trickling down her back. She gasped as the force that had been locking her jaw loosen, causing her to inhale as much air as she could using her mouth. Had she not known better, the act could have been one way for her to escape the intoxication of his sickeningly sweet scent.

"Sylar," she hissed venomously. The rest of her body was still held in place.

"Hello, Claire," Sylar greeted her solicitously, with a syrupy-saccharine smile that made Claire grit her teeth.

"What do you want?"

He pouted slightly, before holding the book up and raised one eyebrow curiously.

"You did not just enter my room to steal a book," she spat.

"Not just _a_ book. _Your_ book," he corrected, "but you were right. I did not just come here to steal some Shakespearean shit," he repeated after her words, his hand waved dramatically.

She snorted at 'Shakespearean shit'.

"I understand that you've been having difficulties in completing your assigned English task," the smirk reappeared on his face, one that Claire wished she could wipe away. Her nostrils flared as she stared at him spitefully. "I came to offer some, ah...assistance," he propositioned cautiously.

This drew an unmistakable confused look on her face. "I can do my homework on my own, thank you," she replied disbelievingly.

"Julius Caesar told me otherwise," Sylar said pointedly. He progressed to flip the pages of the book nonchalantly, caressing the spine as with long, nimble fingers. The deliberate movement managed to enthral her until he spoke again in a sing-song voice, "You've been rather harsh on him, poor thing. And it's all caused by your failure to understand him."

Claire's breath hitched. It was as if Sylar was talking about her treatment on himself, instead of the current subject matter; a dead Roman ruler.

"Tossed. Torn. Unloved," he continued his assessment heedlessly as he traced invisible nothings on the book covers.

"Never took you for the sentimental type," she shot back, because in all honesty, seeing a psychopathic killer fondling her book while sprouting out autobiographical remembrances on said book's behalf was stranger than fiction.

"All caused by your failure, or should I say, _stubborn unwillingness_, to understand..." he trailed off, leaving the statement open-ended.

She refused to meet his accusatory gaze. "Why?"

"Why what?"

"Why do you want to help me? Apart from the obvious pleasure that you'll get from belittling me," Claire swallowed nervously, "what's in it for you?"

"Has it ever occurred to you that I could do things just because?" he inquired lazily.

"Has it ever occurred to you that you are getting a little bit out of character here?" she stood up in defiance, nearly stomping her feet.

"I noticed," he flashed a smug grin, unaffected by her icy stare; amused by her determination to win an argument, no matter how pointless. She did not even realize that he had long released her from his telekinetic hold; that much he did notice.

She stood still.

Time stood still.

_Tick, tick, tick._

"Blond cheerleaders," he rolled his eyes, "and your incessant antics."

Her sweat had long cooled on her brows, yet her body temperature seemed to have shot up a few more degrees.

He sat on her chair, his long legs stretched, and his right foot was nearly touching her left. From his vantage point, she was taller than him, but not quite.

"You let go of me," she said almost dispassionately.

"I noticed that, too. Really, Claire, you should stop pointing out the obvious and start digging for the subtler ones." Sylar stood up, towering at least a few more heads above hers. He opened the book and held it inches from her nose, right at the page she had marked.

"We've been meandering. Time to do some real work, eh?" he tilted his head and used his finger – the same finger he used to slice her head open, she realized – to point at a fluorescently highlighted word: _hubris._

"It reminds me of you," she confessed fumingly.

"Who's the sentimentalist now?" he leered mockingly. "Seriously."

* * *

"It reminds me of you," she insisted. "In fact, you're doing it right now. All arrogant and callous and having the sheer, conceited audacity to come here because you think that you could lecture me on some stupid literature assignment," she bombarded him in one breath.

Sylar was unfazed. "Now, now, you're being redundant. No need to be loquacious to show off your verbosity. I must admit, I am intrigued, but that's not getting us anywhere." He peeked impishly at the page again. "Hubris implies that with great pride, comes the great downfall," he taunted. "The fatal flaw."

Claire found herself nodding sagely, painfully aware that this was questionable behaviour. The chair was no longer occupied, for Sylar had by now lay sprawled on the bed next to her. Too comfortable, she inferred, from the way he pressed his back against the headboard, while his eyes blinked once, twice, thrice into the page.

"Caesar's problem lies in his own reputation. He's not ague-proof. He was likened to Colossus, when in reality he wasn't. He's deaf and epileptic. He strived so hard not just to live, but to live up to his propagandistic reputation." He tossed the book away, which landed between them with a soft thud. "So in what way did his hubristic values remind you of me?" he asked sharply.

Claire was about to open her mouth when he arched his eyebrows and whispered snidely, "We are ague-proof, Claire. As far as I know, neither of us is deaf nor epileptic."

'There's no 'we', just 'you' and 'me'," Claire had wanted to point out, but restrained her tongue from doing so. "I get your point. The point that I'm making is," she retorted instead, "Caesar cannot and will never escape his human limitations. It's a historical fact. But he's never claimed to be immortal, unlike someone I know," she chided. "He's never vehemently denied his physical infirmities."

"Which leads me to my next point," Sylar cut her off impatiently, "since he is a man like everyone else, what makes him so special? What gives him the right to oversee his equals?"

"The man won wars," Claire's voice raised an octave higher. "Or maybe he had abilities too. Whatever it is, he had unlimited power in his prime," she offered obliviously.

"Cellular regeneration is certainly not one of them," he remarked acerbically. "Come to think of it, he's definitely not a clairvoyant. Dismissing the Soothsayer like that..." he chuckled suddenly. "Probably the Soothsayer's really got that power. And Calpurnia, of all people, had your grandmother's talent too; it appears to me...with dreams like that..."

"It's not funny."

His smile faded into an expression that could only mean murder. "He went to the Senate anyway. Despite his wife's warning about the Ides of March. Recounting his military experiences to sooth Calpurnia's fears, and oh, the irony of being stabbed by a bunch of spineless Senators instead. Yet he feared Cassius, the one thing he was right about. But even then, he was too proud to affirm that he himself was scared of the young man, 'for always I am Caesar,' he said."

"He spoke in the third person," Claire commented indifferently.

"Something I don't wish to do."

"But you always reiterate that you are Sylar. Always Sylar. Never Gabriel. _For always you are Sylar_," she snapped. She could feel his eyes scorching her skin, but it was a point she had to drive home. She could hear his jaw clenching, but he remained taciturn. Taking the cue, she spoke. "His weakness," her eyes lit up, "made him stronger. The plebs loved him even after he had an epileptic fit in public. They revered him even more."

Here came the discomfited silence again.

_Tick, tick, tick._

She counted the seconds. _One. Two. Three. Fourfivesixseveneight, ohshit._

"Why do you have to relate everything to me?" he inquired treacherously, completely off-topic.

"Why did you offer to help me in the first place?"

"I asked you first," he grabbed her wrist roughly, the sudden warmth spreading through her body like wildfire. The chill in his eyes, however, betrayed whatever she felt at that moment.

"Julius Caesar was a powerful man. With or without special...abilities, you've got to give him some credit for building the foundations of the great Roman Empire," she began croakily. "His death paved the way for Octavius to rise as Emperor, but not without bloodshed."

"You're indirectly saying that I should die," Sylar growled, his voice a register lower than what she remembered.

His statement ticked her off. "Makes me wonder why I haven't killed you yet," Claire responded with equal ferociousness. After much of that unanticipated scholarly discussion, they were back to square one. Sworn enemies again, instead of academic equals.

"It's a wonder you could last this long without even thinking of killing me," he inched closer, "but that's beside the point," he loosened his grip on her. "You were saying that I should die, because my death will pave the way for the Petrelli Empire to soar sky high. I'm the sacrificial lamb. Oh yes, your manipulative grandparents had seen to that, Claire," his voice dripping with contempt.

Claire's head spun. It wasn't at all what she was trying to tell him. "No, what I'm saying is..." Claire tried to explain, before she froze again, not just because he had held her stiffly in a telekinetic hold again, but because he was on his fours on her bed now, kneeling in front of her, hovering merely inches from her face.

Ready to attack.

Ravish.

"What I'm saying is, Julius Caesar was a proud man, and his actions sometimes may or may not have crossed moral, ethical boundaries. Too proud that he was blinded by his own weaknesses, although he did acknowledge them from time to time...but his blind pride led to his downfall. So..." she faltered, finally grasping what was needed to be grasped, took a deep breath and simply concluded, "I was wrong."

His ears perched.

"You're proud of your powers, just like Caesar was. You were infallible, but Caesar knew he wasn't, because he was mortal, after all. While you were infallible, it didn't mean you couldn't get hurt. And that's your weakness, Sylar. That's where you and Caesar differ, because everyone revered Caesar even after the utmost humiliation that was the seizures. They loved him, even after his death. He lived on. Feared by his enemies, yes. But still loved by everyone else. But you..."

"But I what?" he snarled, urging her to continue. Their noses were almost touching, his hot breath tickling her cheeks, his eyes a whirlpool of darkness and devilish intent and indecipherable desire...

"Nobody loves you, Gabriel," she whispered gutturally. "You may be one proud son-of-a-bitch," she cussed, but that won't be your fatal flaw. You'll be feared and nothing else. You can't make love stay because you don't know how to," she mirrored his words to her, from that time that had seemed so far away now.

It must have frustrated him, her words. Because they rang true. Because there was no tingly sensation that he half-expected from whatever lies she was creating with that silvertongue of hers.

Because her words weren't lies.

_Truth stings like a bitch._

"One, my name is Sylar," he enunciated every syllable warily. "Two, I don't need love..."

"How Machiavellian of you," Claire gasped as Sylar grabbed her arms firmly, his knees nudged between her limp legs.

"And three, I'm beginning to think that history is repeating itself. You see, when Arthur Petrelli died his _real_ death, it had opened countless possibilities to how the Petrelli saga would continue. He was our generation's Julius Caesar. Oh, yes Claire...your grandmother...Angela. She's preparing her army to wage war against anyone that plans to bring down her Republic. You're in her plans, no doubt. Your fathers. Your uncle. Peter," he spat, his mind reeling from a sudden avalanche of unrestricted realizations.

"Question is," he whispered breathily as he squeezed her arms, "Who's gonna be on Mark Antony's side? Who's gonna be on Octavian's side, eh Claire?" his eyelids fluttered, his dark gaze focused on her cerulean-green eyes. His long eyelashes became Claire's fixation as she gave in, breathing in as much _him_ as possible. "Love brought Antony down, Claire. Remember your history. Remember Cleopatra?"

As soon as the Egyptian queen's name escaped his lips, Sylar pulled away from Claire in haste. The name tolled like a warning bell at the back of his mind. One that told him he should not be here in the first place.

"You will not tempt me," he professed sternly as he clambered out of her bedroom window. He flicked his fingers, releasing her from the invisible chains he had used upon her and unlocked the bedroom door at the same time. She would remember this sight of him, as he threw her one last look, one that was filled with a mixture of longing and lust and listless lament.

"Wait," she jumped off the bed and almost ran towards him, almost begging him to stay. Yet, she ended up asking just one last thing: "Why did you help me tonight?"

He shrugged; his ears perched up sensitively. His heightened sense of hearing told him that someone was coming. "Footsteps," he mouthed, before vanishing into the night's darkness.

"Next week it's The Taming of the Shrew," Claire said to an open window, as the breeze blew softly across her cheeks, enveloping her trembling body like a soft blanket.

Several knocks came on the door. "Claire-bear?"

Claire plastered a fake smile on her face before turning slowly. "Hi, Dad."

"Just checking up on you," Noah walked towards her, wrapping his arms around his daughter. "It's cold outside. Why did you open the windows?"

"Oh, it's just stuffy in here. Need to...vent a little," Claire replied. If Noah had noticed her peculiar pattern of speech, he did not show it. Reluctantly, Claire closed the windows and walked to her desk.

"Julius Caesar?" Noah picked up the book from the bed, raising an eyebrow.

"English assignment," Claire winked. "Next week it's going to be The Taming of the Shrew," she said again, the smile still hadn't left her face.

When Noah left the room, Claire shivered. She proceeded to sit at her chair in front of her computer, still feeling the warmth emanating from the seat Sylar had long vacated.

Maybe fathoming the complexities of 16th century English wasn't too hard after all.

"Next week," she murmured.

_Next week._

* * *

A/N: That was my first time writing a Heroes fic. *sweatdrops*. Written for the challenge at the sylaire_chall LJ comm, with the prompt 'Empire'. Constructive comments are appreciated! :)


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